Wisdom, which comes
from the simplest logic, would have been that the leaders of the
world behave as the following way, in the interest of the
Humanity:

to
favour human societies' autarky,

to
favour the energy sources and foods decentralization,

to
favour the decentralization and spacing out human dwellings,

to
increase the small autonomous energy sources (solar power station,
micro water power plants, etc...),

to
multiply and develop local natural food sources,

to
protect the bio-diversity which is a source of supply accessible to
all in times of crisis,

to
delocalize for the benefit of small towns, production and life
centers.

In other words,
fractioning the risks of destruction of a fragile civilization
(that is dependent on technology) by the independence of the
sources that provide our vital needs, and spacing out the places
of life.

Well, they
did the exact opposite !

This led to the
actual conditions of urban life more and more unhealthier, so far
that they are now very dangerous. A lot of people are aware of the
situation and aspire to a simpler, healthier and more natural life
-in short, a more pleasant life - in a refuge with no pollution,
no stress and useless restlessness and agitation. But most of the
people don't know how to escape the hell where they are living and
they have no idea where to go. They also would like to have the
opportunity to experiment this new way of life before completely
giving up their actual way of living, which could lead them to
brave multiples material problems.

As a result, my aim is to
found these autonomous villages of wholesome life, at first in
Thailand, since it's the country where I live.

In the first place, I only
have to find the right location (which will not be hard to do) :

1° with
sufficient and permanent natural supplies of pure water,

2° next to the
place, some land that can be ploughed, flood-proof and where
it's allowed to build by law,

3° adjoining a
forest, as vast and intact as possible (there are still a lot
here!),

4 ° the place has
to be located near a traditional "moo baan" (a Thai village) of
which the "pou Yai baan" (the Chief) sees no inconvenient in
welcoming westerners (most of them are enthusiastic regarding
the resources these people, who are for the most of them quite
poor, can obtain) ;

5 ° not too far
from a main town to be able to get supplied with industrial
products, and for a convenient access to one of the local
airports (Thai Airways provides a service to all the main
cities in Thailand)

I will start to search for
the right location as early as September 2003, and purchase the
land immediately after I found that it fits the 5 points above. My
objective is that everything has to be completed in
2004.

The Spirit that
leads this Creation

Meow
village and its fields in the mountains of South East Asia.
Copyright sens-de-la-vie.com

Project:
"The Villages of Wholesome Life"

Our aim is to create
genuine small villages where life can be pleasant, healthy and
autonomous. It concerns to create a viable alternative for all
those who wish to change -or just experiment- a very new way of
life, with absolutely no ideology.

We do not want to create a
village to show something, such as a theory, or to live a special
experience such as the new age communities suggest.

We
simply want that people find a feeling of total well-being and
can achieve to live the life they've always been dreaming
about.

Our concept is simple:

1. Autarky, the refuge
of life:

The basic
principle of the village is a total independence. Autacy will
make possible a kind of meditation, isolation, independence and
security that many people are seeking for. This village will be
a refuge of serene life, far from any kind of pollutions,
aggressions and servitudes.

2. Natural resources and
environment:

The residents will
have to produce their own organic food, or to shop at the local
food producers. (Farming will be done in small quantity, enough
to live well). The village in itself will also provide
employment -since it will be associated to a tourist resort for
temporary visitors- and other kind of resources will obviously
be welcomed. All the residents will have to avoid intervening
on the nature as much possible as they can, because a durable
independent life is only possible in a wholesome place.
Dwellings will be spaced out.

3. An autonomous way of
living and thinking:

The whole project
is not linked with any ideology. Our goal is based on
flexibility and tolerance. The residents -and only them- will
have to find ideas or solutions to solve problems, and/or to
propose new ways to consider how the matter can be solved. Each
one will be free to choose his/her own way of living and
thinking. But any collective decision will have to be discussed
collectively. There will not be any specific rule of life. We
trust in their common sense and wise judgement. Nevertheless,
it's obvious that any decision must accord with local
laws.

4. Human education:

We will also offer
a Human Education Course, to learn the numerous behaviours that
residents should observe. Mutual good relationships and respect
of the others will be the basic teaching, to make possible a
harmonious village of life. The village will also offer
workshops with different activities. It will offer a huge free
scope for creativity for the residents, since they will lead
these activities by themselves. We can think about yoga,
Tai-Chi, music, meditation, traditional dance, local cooking
classes, and also learning from people coming from outside,
invited by the residents, about their activities or their job.
Anyway, residents are free to participate in these activities
or not. As we already mentioned above: the main point is to
live well, with oneself as well as with the others, by
respecting everything and everyone around us. This is our main
concern regarding the whole project.

A Big
Project, but easy to realize:

In short, this village will
be created only by choice of discovery, learning of new things,
and improvement of knowledge as well as personal
improvement.

The first step -that is
very easy in Thailand- will be to find a native culture already
established, able to facilitate the residents' independence on a
long term. As a result, one of the residents' aims will be to know
and understand the local culture, and to be able to adjust to it.
This first stage completed, the residents will rest
easy.

The second step is to be
able to offer a continuity to this village, in its creative
aspects as well as the refuge it offers. One of the main factors
will be the quality of life we will propose to the residents,
especially concerning leisure, local products, and the local
villagers welcoming. This quality of life will widely contribute
to their well-being.

Our success will be
considered on the long term, and the principal condition to the
realization of success is already explained above. Moreover,
considering that the general wish will be to be able to live a
wholesome and healthy life there should have no major problems
coming from the residents of the village, and we are convinced
that their happiness will be the best guarantee of the village's
long life (Patrick L. & Alain).

Practical
conception of the villages

Here are some
practical facts to take into consideration:

A)Occupants: they could be permanent residents as well as
vacationers who want to resource themselves, in a different way
than the classical tour operators. The permanent community will
be in charge of welcoming the temporary visitors.

B) Integration:
westerners often carry mental pollutions from their birth
(especially aggressiveness, but not only that...), and this is
why most of them are not able to adjust themselves to Thailand,
even if the country tolerates them. We will absolutely try to
avoid these killjoy by a selection, followed by a training on
Thai custom and politeness. Residents will also have to learn
the language otherwise they will not be able to communicate
with the local people.

Important
remark: in Thailand, there is no generation ditch, and all
the elders are respected. Thai people do not criticize, do
not make fun of the others and do not judge: for them, it's
a natural way of being. Smiling, perfect politeness,
patience, never rising the tone, and respect are their usual
human relationship norms. Getting angry or rising the tone,
as it's so usual in the western world, would bring about to
lose the Thais' esteem, and even to expose oneself to their
contempt or violence -which is instantaneous and strong- in
case of a serious insult.

C) The size:
should not exceed 10 / 12 houses, because the authorizations
would be longer to obtain to build more dwellings.

D) Autarky: once
the water and the food autarky obtained, it will remain the
electricity that will technically be easy to get but probably
quite expensive regarding the solar panels investment: we will
have to import them, and I think that the import taxes should
be quite heavy. We will need the help of foreign experts: the
best regarding solar power certainly are the
Australians.

Nota
: we also can envisage diesel generators since these engines
can work with palm oil, which is a local production, and it
would avoid the arduous management of the batteries that are
necessary to the solar energy. Cf:
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/philippelopes/Phys30010Nouveaux%20carburants.htm.

E) Work: it's
possible to work in Thailand but foreigners need a work permit,
that is not allowed to all professions. Some professions are
only allowed to Thai people. Nevertheless, I know that some
French people have created farms in Thailand, and I will try to
get more information about the way they work.

F) Marijuana et
drugs: the use, possession or selling of drugs are severely
punished in Thailand. I am not personally concerned at all
because I am totally virgin in this matter. And I know that
"joints" of marijuana are very popular in the western world, so
people living in the village should avoid it -or take a very
big risk: only one joint and you may go to jail for 2 years!
Regarding the "quality of life" in Thai prisons I do not
recommend anybody to try such an experience, and I will be very
intransigent on this point.

G) Activities:
each village should have one or many meeting points (the
village's heart-s-) that allow the residents to practice the
activities they prefer -meditation, cooking classes, etc...-.
We have to plan the structure(s) but we think that nothing has
to be imposed, and certainly not a compulsory presence of the
residents like at the mass!

H) Village management
and its financial resources (investment and concern):
regarding Thai laws non-lucrative associations are unknown, and
foundations only can be created by obtaining a Royal
Authorization that is nearly impossible to get, regarding all
the conditions to fulfill. As a result, the only possible
structure is a Company limited, of which 51% of the shares must
be hold by Thais (which is not a problem).

i) Visas: no
problem.

J) Food:
traditionally, residents of these kind of villages produce
their own organic food, which is obviously what we aim to do
for those who enjoy small farming. But I would like to
emphasize that this activity will not be essential because
farmers from Issaan (North-Eastern Thailand), where we plan to
build the first village, ONLY produce natural products; and the
prices are so low that I doubt we can do better than they
do.

L) The village's
resources to trade with the "world outside": will mainly
come from the temporary visitors who come to resource
themselves (resort aspect), more than from farming even if it
can become an interesting activity if it's specialized in the
production of innovative food products that are easy to
trade.

M) Way of
working: concerning the internal management of these small
human communities, I do not want to intervene on this "politic"
aspect, because Life is a Source that creates diversity that we
can not limit; Residents will decide altogether by
themselves.

N) Ideology Zero:
all the communities founded on ideologies have failed, as we
know. Then if there is absolutely no ideology in our villages,
and that their residents are free to invent or test whatever
suits them the best and have the opportunity/freedom to change
until they find their own private way... How could we fail? I
think that it will be interesting to see what solutions the
residents will invent. My point of view, mainly inspired by the
American Indians, is to refuse the so-called democracy that
allows the majority to impose to the minority what it refuses.
I think that the only rule is that the agreement must be
accepted unanimously by all the parties. Interesting
discussions should take place under the "Tepee" of the
committee!

O) In
case of insoluble disagreement: the solution will be to
allow the minority to found its own village of wholesome life
in accordance with the rules it advocates and give this
community concrete possibilities.

Synthesis

In a word: there
is not only one model of village of life which implies
self-determination and freedom to found villages of different
spirits and different types, as well as financial support... and
it's on its way! My opinion is that each village should work like
an ordinary "resort", except in its specificities that have to
respect the spirit of its creation.

You will be given
some more precise information shortly.

The First Village

The first village
will be built somewhere in the North-East of Thailand, called
"Issaan" in Thai language, of which the population originally
comes from Laos.

The legendary
kindness, excellent and varied cuisine, entertaining
and pleasant music, traditional dances, and all the
beautiful traditions of the Issaan people are highly
appreciated by the Thais from the other provinces as
well as numerous westerners.

Moreover, the northern part
of this province offers a climate -cooler and less humid- that is
more temperate (much like "Provence", a southern French province).
The place to build the village will be definitely set before the
end of the year 2003.

Regarding my personal
experience, the most comfortable dwellings are wooden houses. Here
are some samples of the Thai traditional houses that you can
easily afford, as they are locally produced.

The house on the left is a
kind of activity/meeting room completely opened on the nature (all
windows are foldable),

while the house on the
right is a typical Thai style dwelling.

FYI: a luxurious house of
70 m² -at the second floor (which is 140 m² living space
if you fit out the first floor into a living area) made in teak
wood as the one above, costs about 43,000 Euros -teak furniture
included: and this is the most expansive kind of wooden house in
the country! Houses made of concrete, bricks and ceramic, that are
lovely too, cost a little more than 50% than wooden
houses.

Anyway, if you are
still young and brave enough you still can build a traditional hut
by yourself, such as the one below, which is accessible to any
budgets.

The price of
the lands in the Issaan province are very cheap, about 2,000 Euros
per "Rai" that is 1600 Meter square. Nevertheless, in the South of
the country price a a lot more expensive: 22,000 - 88,000 Euros
for the same area.

The reasons why
this project will succeed:

In my childhood
(1940's-1950's ) almost all the villages were Villages of Life in
a way, likewise all the Issaan (North-Eastern Thailand) villages
are still, at the present time, all Villages of Life. This point
seriously simplifies our project that makes use of all these major
assets to succeed.

The first asset
resides in the fact that what we want already exists at the
natural state!

In my opinion, a
village of Life -which means respectful of the environment and
independent- is possible only if the villagers adjust
themselves to the traditions and the know-how -ancient but
still alive- of an already existing "friendly" community, and
if they also can adapt to their new lives in a pragmatic way.
Now, the "know-how" already exists where we plan to build the
village, and the last thing that will need to be cleared for
the future residents is a proper training for their new life:
and we are highly competent for this kind of task. We will just
have to train them to live in osmosis with the nature and to
understand (and respect) a new culture -that is also very
pleasant. The rest is only a question of personal adjustment
and invention of simple solutions.

The second asset
resides in the state of mind (free from any doctrine) that will
lead these villages.

Another important
point is: "ideology-zero", which means it is not essential that
all the means to do everything possible should be only organic,
even if most of the products will be of this nature (no
fundamentalism!). And if it's more practical to temporarily use
non-organic means or products, we will do it! There is a big
difference between adjusting our own needs with the environment
-with respect, flexibility and no doctrine-, than destroying
everything blindly just like the actual industrial civilization
presently does. We think that a step towards "the good" is
still better than stagnation in "the bad". This is where our
way of thinking makes the difference because of its
flexibility, and this is why our "Villages of Wholesome Life"
will succeed.

The third asset resides in the fact that this project fits very
strong human feelings:

01 - A wholesome
place and way of life.

02 - A gentle ecology
adapted to the environment.

03 - Rejection of the
fashionable ideologies and fake spiritualities.

04 - Economical
autonomy.

05 - Self-management by
the residents.

06 - Search of a balance
between soul and spirit through resourcing spiritual and
authentic activities.

07 - Real training of
the 21th century executives/elites.

08 - New feelings and
exotism.

09 - High quality
leisure for a very cheap cost.

10 - A very friendly
human indigenous environment.

the fourth asset resides in the fact that all the costs will be
very cheap.

To be followed ...

Useful
Information about Thailand

Many people asked me
important questions concerning Thailand and its laws. I divided
these questions in two groups, the first concerning:

Regulations concerning Thai children adoption,

The rights to own a land in Thailand,

Work permits in Thailand,

Professions forbidden to aliens,

Marriage in Thailand,

Visas, immigration, and how to obtain the Thai
nationality.

I do not see the necessity
to do again what already exists: you can find all the answers to
these questions on the following websites. (warning:these websites
are in French language).

http://www.franco-thai.com/loi_thai.html. This very interesting
website -by Mr. Patrice- will give you information about Thai
laws.

http://bottu.org/histoire_ndx.htm Mr. Alain Bottu
invites you to discover Thailand. You will discover fruit
carving, Thai food recipes from his wife Wongniphon and some
tremendous pictures. Thai history is well explained with some
interesting anecdotes.

For the moment this
sites are in French, but soon I will found similar in
English.

Answers
to other F.A.Q.:

Are the formalities
complicated?

Answer: The first
time you have a look at Thai laws concerning the rights to own
a land, work permits, marriage with a Thai person, or visas and
immigration may look very complicated and impossible.

I've been living here
since 1995, and I know from my own experience that all of these
conspicuous problems have a simple solution, according to Thai
laws. Moreover, Thai officials -who are quite meticulous
regarding the official formalities- are very helpful and
accommodating to the foreigners who behave properly and
politely.

Is the country
secure ?

Answer: personal
safety is a hundred times bigger than in western countries,
which is a fact that a few westerners understand! It's due to
the Thai culture that avoids (free) violence, the efficiency of
Thai Police Corps and above all, the "Smiling culture" or what
they call the "Mai pen rai" -a kind of "don't worry, be
happy!"

How to make a living in
Thailand? How to earn money to live?

Answer: Most of
the westerners work in the service field: which means that they
have their own company or they are employed by international
-or Thai- firms. Actually, the company that will create this
Village of Wholesome Life will have the right to employ
foreigners for different fields (hospitality or other) because
the village will be associated to a resort. Here is the list of
the profession that foreigners can not perform:

Various questions about
water, electricity, internet and mobile phones:

Answer: drinkable
water resources are large and easy to find; personally, I drink
the water from my own well and I do not need to purify it,
because it's useless. The electric autonomy will be provided by
diesel generators that can work with the local palm oil.
Internet connection will be made with satellite -that I am
actually using, for a cost of 65 Euros per month (unlimited
connection). You can find cyber Cafes here more than everywhere
else in the world. And mobile phones connection are excellent
throughout the country.

Sens-de-la-vie.com will be
here to help all of those who will decide to start a new life in
Thailand, a marvellous country. The best is that you come to
discover this country by yourself when the project will be
ready.

You can help this project
right now by clicking on the "OK" below, read this donation's
chapter, and then close the window. Thank you.

The Webmaster's team:

" Thanks for
your visit, we hope that you enjoy and will support our site
"